Nate Silver noted yesterday that “Since conventions, Obama has led 64-27 (+37) on average in polls of Latino voters. He won them 67-31 (+36) in 2008.” This morning, a new Wall Street Journal/Telemundo poll came out showing Obama leading among Latinos by a whopping 50 points–71 percent to 21 percent.
Since conventions, Obama has led 64-27 (+37) on average in polls of Latino voters. He won them 67-31 (+36) in 2008.
— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) October 2, 2012
One thing that made Farenthold’s campaign different from many others in 2010 was his decision to directly attack his opponent’s record on abortion. “In the general election, we made a big issue of Ortiz’s voting on pro-life [issues],” says Farenthold. While Farenthold’s campaign hit Ortiz with what little money it had in a TV ad for voting with “liberal pro-abortion politicians in Washington” and even voting for “taxpayer-funded abortions,” Ortiz insisted throughout the campaign that he was and always had been pro-life.
Steve Ray, Farenthold’s pollster and consultant, told me that Ortiz’s vote for Obamacare’s final passage was particularly toxic. Before that, Ortiz had never taken a high profile vote in favor of abortion. Ray thinks that the issue moved a significant number of votes in the heavily Hispanic district that stretches along the Gulf coast from Corpus Christi to the Rio Grande. Strongly pro-life voters “will vote for someone who is pro-life even if they disagree with someone who is against them on every one else,” Ray said. “We actually had signs touting Blake’s pro-life position at the polls, and we heard people would walk out”—voters who couldn’t vote for a Republican but also couldn’t vote for a Democrat who didn’t oppose abortion.
asdfasdf
